If anyone came to Cycles of Success expecting to get the inside dish on Hollywood from Tonya Lewis Lee, well, let’s just say that isn’t what she delivered. The wife of filmmaker Spike Lee may run in some glamorous circles, but if she did have any juicy tales, this luncheon benefiting Florence Crittenton Services wasn’t going to be where she shared them.

Lewis Lee is a highly focused attorney who has written three best-selling children’s books and is the national face of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ national campaign to improve infant mortality rates. She was born to parents who were descended from slaves and lived in Milwaukee and St. Louis before moving to New York City, where her father had a 30-year career in the finance department of Philip Morris. She has degrees from Sarah Lawrence College and the University of Virginia law school and represented media giant Gannett on corporate and First Amendment issues as an attorney practicing in Washington, D.C.

She met Spike Lee after graduating law school; six months after they were married she became pregnant. Motherhood brought some startling revelations, including that for her to “be a good mom, I had to be a good Tonya first.” She found it was indeed possible to pursue her own passions — including nutrition, good health and early childhood development — without sacrificing the day-to-day pleasures that come with raising a child.

With her husband, she wrote three children’s book, “Please Baby Please,” “Please Puppy Please” and “Giant Steps to Change the World.” She also became an award-winning television producer; her documentary, “I Sit Where I Want,” first aired on the 50th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education. She also produces Black History Month segments for Nickelodeon and Nick at Night and wrote the 2004 best-seller “Gotham Diaries.”

At Cycles of Success, held in the Seawell Grand Ballroom, she spoke to an audience that included teen moms and such civic leaders as state Rep. Angela Williams; Denver’s first lady, Mary Louise Lee; Mayor Michael Hancock’s chief of staff, Janice Sinden; Mile High United Way president Christine Benero; Hispanic Chamber of Commerce president James Mejia; the Urban League’s chief executive, Landri Taylor; Tom Downey, director of the city’s Department of Excise and Licenses; Helen Drexler, chair of the Florence Crittenton board; and Caz Matthews, who purchased copies of “Giant Steps to Change the World” for the students at Florence Crittenton High School.

The luncheon emcee, Gloria Neal of CBS4, introduced FloCrit success story students Melissa Valles and Evangaline Martinez by reminding the audience that “Just because you have trouble early in life, it doesn’t mean your life is over.”

“Our students have many challenges to overcome,” acknowledged Susan Carparelli, FloCrit’s president and chief executive officer. “They come from fragile families and are living on the edge. Yet they are here; they recognize they are role models to their kids and for them to do well, they (the moms) must do well.” Carparelli also introduced a film that was produced for Florence Crittenton Services after the agency was named one of Bank of the West’s Philanthropy Award recipients earlier this year.

Study after study has shown that when it comes to charitable fundraisers, Denver has more per capita than any comparably sized city in the nation. Joanne Davidson has been covering them for The Denver Post since 1985, coming here from her native California where she'd spent the previous seven years as San Francisco bureau chief for U.S. News & World Report magazine.